


fear the fall (and where we'll land)

by dustofwarfare



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Banter, Face Slapping, M/M, Pre-Altissia, Slight Canon Divergence, ardyn is very strong, consensual snarky sex, noctis only wearing boots, sex in a dungeon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-09
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-06-07 18:29:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15225297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustofwarfare/pseuds/dustofwarfare
Summary: Ardyn grabs Noctis’s wrists, pinning them above his head against the damp stone. “Oh, but you don’t understand, Noctis. Your blade at my throat is all I’ve ever wanted.”(In which Ardyn is the only one who accompanies Noctis in his search for the mythril in Steyliff Grove. Amidst half-heartedly fighting off daemons he himself is summoning, getting lost a few times for kicks and battling a giant monster, Ardyn is surprised to learn just why Noctis thought he wanted to tag along in the first place.)





	fear the fall (and where we'll land)

**Author's Note:**

> My thanks to Marmolita for the beta AND for the idea, which was all her fault because I said I wanted to write more in-game Ardynoct and she suggested, "What if Ardyn insisted he go with Noctis to find the mythril, instead of Aranea?" and this happened. 
> 
> For R3zuri, who appreciates snarky ardynoct and will, I hope, enjoy this (slightly less hateful, but still full of mild dislike) take on pre-Altissia Ardynoct. Title from the Tamer song "Beautiful Crime" :D
> 
> (There is no non-con or dub-con in this story).

 

**i. the grove**

“I don’t like it,” Ignis says, frowning in consternation. “There is no reason why you should be venturing into some dungeon without Prompto and I to assist you. The mere fact he wants you to do so is suspicious.”

“I _am_ right here,” Ardyn says, amicably enough, leaning against one of the massive stone pillars.

Ignis is correct. There really _is_ no reason why Noctis should have to go into the dungeon to find the mythril with no one but Ardyn for company. He most assuredly should have Ignis and the little gunman along for backup. If Noctis insists, Ardyn will bow out and leave the three of them with Aranea.

Noctis will find the mythril, one way or the other. But Ardyn can’t help wondering if Noctis will agree to head into the temple with no one but Ardyn for company.

“It’s fine, Specs,” the prince says, his lean body all tension and sharp angles, draped as ever in funeral black. “Can’t be that dangerous if _he’s_ willing to go down there with me.”

Ardyn smiles. _Oh, how easily you underestimate me._

“Noct,” Prompto says, chewing on his bottom lip. His eyes dart to-and-fro, from Noctis to Ignis to him, and back again. Like a circuit. “Um. Maybe it’s not the dungeon you gotta worry about.”

Well, at least that one is smarter than he looks. Quite the surprise. Ardyn spreads his hands and gives an easy shrug. “If you’ve not gathered by now that I’m trying to help you, then I’m not sure what else I can do to convince you.”

“Why don’t _you_ go down and get the mythril, and we’ll stay right here and wait for you,” says Prompto, whose name will never not be ridiculous to Ardyn. “Seems like that’s what a helpful person would do.”

“And so I would, were I a bit younger and more daring,” Ardyn prevaricates. “Perhaps I am afraid of the dark, dear Cito.”

Prompto scowls. “It’s Prompto,” he says. “And I might believe you got dressed in the dark, but not that you’re afraid of it.”

Ardyn sweeps him a bow. The lad is oddly dressed enough that Ardyn doesn’t think he has quite the leg to stand on, but he lets it go, regardless.  “My apologies. Prompto.”

“No one is going down there alone,” Noctis interrupts. “Ignis. You and Prompto help Aranea with the daemons. We’ll go get the mythril and meet up with you.” He glances at Ardyn as if waiting for him to argue with what is essentially Ardyn’s plan.

“There are a few hours yet until sundown,” Ardyn says. “Why don’t the three of you make camp? I shall await you here, Your Highness. Come to me when it is full dark, and we shall find what you seek.”

He wonders if Noctis will correct him on the form of address. Technically, since Regis is dead, Noctis is a king -- a _majesty_ , not a _highness_. Ardyn doubts anyone is as eager to afford Noctis his proper title as much as he is, but he refuses to do so until he knows for certain that Noctis deserves it.

Noctis doesn’t seem like he cares _what_ Ardyn calls him, though. He turns back toward his slightly diminished retinue and walks off, leaving Ardyn alone amidst the ruins.

**ii. entrance**

Noctis returns an hour after nightfall.

Ardyn isn’t sure if Noctis made him wait on purpose or if he just lost track of time, but he supposes it doesn’t really matter. It’s not as if Ardyn isn’t used to waiting on Noctis.

He doesn’t look afraid of Ardyn, but he does look a little wary; like maybe he wishes one of his retainers was with him, if not both. Ardyn wonders what became of the big one, the Shield, but he doesn’t ask.

“You needn’t worry, Your Highness,” Ardyn says, his voice gentle. “I do not intend to harm you. I mean only to help you retrieve your mythril, you have my word.”

Noctis looks very attractive standing there in the moonlight, face bathed in the muted glow from his lantern; all thickly-lashed eyes and full mouth. Ardyn hadn’t lied when he’d called him _fetching_ back in Insomnia.

“That’s the thing I can’t figure out, though,” Noctis says, pretty eyes narrowed. “Why are you helping me? You shouldn’t be.”

“Perhaps not.” Ardyn waves a hand. “Truly, if you’d prefer to go down with your friends, I shall go and send them to accompany you.”

And he will, if Noctis wishes it. This is just a diversion, a momentary fancy in which he – King of Death, Fallen Star, the Accursed – leads Noctis -- the Chosen King, Star of Light, the Savior -- down into a temple of death.

_A king of Lucis once walked here, with an Oracle. The Oracle fell and the King took up her staff. You, the last of the Lucian kings, will take the thing you find here and cross the seas, where the Oracle will fall and you will take up her staff._

Ardyn cannot help making himself a whetstone on which the blade of his own destruction is being sharpened, as if it gives him some illusion of control when he knows better than anyone there is none to be had.

“Truly,” he says, as the Scourge whispers desires dark and decadent his ear, “I shall do whatever you wish. My only aim is to see you find that which you seek.”

“Let’s just get this over with,” Noctis says, and heads toward the entrance. “You have a weapon or something? I have plenty, but I’m not letting you use any of them.”

Ardyn almost laughs. Noctis has an Armiger, but it cannot rival Ardyn’s own. There are weapons at his disposal that Noctis will never find, from tombs that fell into the sea or crumbled into dust long ago. He all but _aches_ to show them off to someone who would appreciate it, but it is not yet time.

He indicates a crossbow he quietly manifested before Noctis appeared. It is Ardyn’s oldest and most trusted weapon, the one he thinks they might have buried him with if he’d been destined for a royal tomb. Though he would have much preferred his healer’s staff -- not that the Astrals cared a whit for what he preferred. Clearly.

“This shall do me well enough,” he says, resting the crossbow on his shoulder.

“Well, don’t shoot me with it on accident,” Noctis says, but his eyes are on the bow as he draws forward, clearly intrigued by the weapon. “I’ve never seen a crossbow like that before. Prompto uses one, but it’s more…uh. Mechanical, I guess.”

 _Modern_ is what he likely means, but doesn’t say. How kind of Noctis to spare Ardyn’s feelings.

Ardyn hands it over, easy as anything, ignoring the thrill that goes up his spine at the sight of the Chosen King handling the weapon that has been his longer than any other. Past and present and future, so close now that Ardyn can almost taste it in the humid air of the grove. “This one is a bit outdated. I built it myself quite some time ago, and never felt the urge to alter it.”

“Yeah. Not like a politician really needs a weapon, huh?” Noctis examines the bow with an eye that says that he knows how to use one, hand running down the shaft of the weapon.

It makes Ardyn’s daemons howl and his cock stir – both are unnecessary distractions at the moment, though neither are unpleasant.  “One would think you know well enough how dangerous the world of politics can be.”

Predictably, that seems to remind Noctis that they are supposed to be enemies. He shoves the weapon at Ardyn and says gruffly, “If you can’t keep up or you slow me down, I’ll finish this myself.”

“As you wish,” Ardyn says, hiding his smirk with a bow.

“Then let’s go.” Noctis heads off toward the entrance of the dungeon, stalking through the water like he’s going off to war.

They pause at the door, resolutely closed during the day and now wide-open, a gaping maw of inky black waiting beyond. “Very well. Tell me, which of us shall be first into the breach, as it were?”

“You know what they say. Fortune favors the bold,” says Noctis, and heads down into the dark.

_Fortune favors the bold._

Ardyn knows the expression well, for it’s a translation of old Lucian that has endured to this day – unlike the correct pronunciation of _Lucis Caelum_ , which will annoy Ardyn until the day the Chosen King sends him tumbling into oblivion – but that’s never been the entirety of the expression, merely the flashy bit people remembered.

“ _Audaces fortuna iuvat,_ _sed coronat victor patientia_ ,” Ardyn murmurs, staring down at Noctis as he vanishes into the gloom.

_Fortune favors the bold, but patience crowns the victor._

“What?” Noctis calls up at him, from below. “You say something?”

“Nothing of merit, Your Highness,” Ardyn calls back. “Nothing at all.”

**iii. first floor**

There are daemons here, Ardyn can feel them, though he holds them back for the moment. Plenty of time for that later; now, he wants to let Noctis explore, wants him to relax his guard.

Noctis sees something glimmering in the corner, and he reaches out for it like a child seeking a shiny toy. There’s a rumble and a cascade of rocks when he does, which Ardyn is petty enough to admit he finds rather delightful.

“What a shame,” Ardyn says.  “My, I do hope that wasn’t the mythril.”

“Nah, it wasn’t.” Noctis seems unconcerned. “They never put the good stuff on the first floor.” He stops and looks back at Ardyn,  who is taking his sweet time following simply because he can. “All these stairs slowing you up, old man?”

“Merely appreciating the journey,” Ardyn offers, his voice echoing off the cavernous stones. “This was a sacred place, once. Very historically interesting.”

“Yeah,” Noctis says. “I read the sign outside. What does the Empire want here, anyway, if not the mythril?”

“The Empire utilizes daemons from this region as specimens for research,” Ardyn answers, as Noctis pushes on an elaborate door, which shudders and opens to reveal another passageway.  

“What?” Noctis turns to face him, a broken staircase littered with rocks rising up behind him. “What’s the Empire want with daemons? Or are you just fucking with me?”

The Empire does want daemons, and Ardyn is most assuredly with him, but those things are not mutually exclusive so all he says is, “Research for the MT program. Were you not aware daemons play an integral part in their creation? I thought that was common knowledge. Silly me.”

“Common knowledge that…what? MTs are daemons?”

“MTs utilize daemonic energy,” Ardyn corrects, neatly stepping over a pile of rubble. “If we are to be plagued with the presence of daemons, it behooves us to find a way to utilize them, does it not?”

“For war?” Noctis demands, burning with righteous indignation. It’s a good look on him, Ardyn thinks. Makes his magic burn like a flame, lights up the depths of his eyes.

“Yes,” Ardyn says. “Lucis weaponized the magic of the King with its Glaives. Niflheim chose another method. War is about destruction, Noctis. It is about who can harvest the resources at their disposal and lay waste to their enemy with brutal, timely efficiency. A war of attrition is not pretty, but it is one that ends eventually.”

There is a faint sheen of red in Noctis’s eyes. “That’s – how can you fucking say that? You’re -- you said it yourself, you’re not even affiliated with the army! You’re a politician, aren’t you supposed to care about the people?”

_Once upon a time, the people were all I cared about. And here I stand, Accursed and Immortal and destined to drown the world._

“I did not invent war,” Ardyn murmurs, standing close enough he can feel the heat from Noctis’s body. He thinks about placing a hand on Noctis’s shoulder, thrills at the idea of touching him, this long-awaited king, this weapon meant to slay him. “I have merely been involved in the fighting of it, same as many others.”

“If the Empire wasn’t trying to take over Lucis –”

“We aren’t here to discuss politics,” Ardyn interrupts. “And if that’s what you wish to do, then perhaps later I shall be of a mind to indulge you. I am not disinclined toward a healthy debate, but it will waste time better spent seeking your mythril, hmm?”

“But _why are you helping me_ ,” Noctis bites out, getting up in Ardyn’s space, all his warmth and sparking anger making Ardyn’s fingers curl into his palms. He’s never wanted to _touch_ Noctis before, a blade not yet quite finished in the forge but enough to want to feel the shape and weight of it in your hand.  “You’re the _Imperial Chancellor._ You’re supposed to be fighting for Niflheim, aren’t you?”

Ardyn shrugs. “There isn’t much of a war left to fight, is there?” There’s a hint of cruelty in Ardyn’s smile, a mean little barb he throws out like a spell.  

“Because your _fucking army_ invaded my city and killed my father!” Noctis’s indignation rings out loud in the enclosed stone chamber. There’s a flash of glorious blue light, and Noctis faces him with a familiar sword in hand like he means to kill him, right here in this ancient temple of death.

Ardyn is half-tempted to let him try, just for the novelty.

But Noctis cannot kill him; he hasn’t the strength or the blessing of the Crystal. Ardyn cannot kill Noctis for the same reasons, so they are safe enough from each other. “I propose a moratorium on discussions of a political nature until we are outside. It will do no good to hash out things that have happened; war is an unpleasant business and the winning of it even more so. I am the Imperial Chancellor and I am willingly aiding you in this _as I have in other things_ , so perhaps I have reasons more in line with your own that I simply cannot divulge at this time.”

“Oh, shut up,” Noctis hisses, but his weapon is gone in a flash and he turns to climb the stairs.

Ardyn follows, humming some old, long-forgotten tune under his breath. This is all turning out to be quite the adventure. Very enlightening.

**iv. second floor**

“Wow,” Noctis breathes, coming to a halt. He tilts his head back, staring up at the reflection of the water above. “Is – are we under the water?”

“We may very well be,” Ardyn says. “Solheim had unmatched skill in magical engineering – it is, so they say, why the gods chose to smite them.”

Noctis glances sharply at him. “Wait. What? I thought they destroyed themselves in a civil war or something.”

Ardyn makes a face. What sort of history are they teaching children nowadays? “In a sense. Solheim’s progress was seen as unseemly in the eyes of the gods, for they took to sky and sea in a way no mortal was meant to do. They thought the Pyreburner would protect them – the citizens of Solheim revered him above all others, and thought themselves safe under his care.”

“Right. They worshipped fire and that’s why their temple for the dead is under water, ‘cause water puts out fire.” Noctis gives him a grim approximation of a smile. “Like I said. I read the sign.”

“Oh, history is lost on the youth,” Ardyn says, shaking his head. He sees something approaching from the corner – a daemon, scuttling toward them, likely attracted by Ardyn’s presence as much as Noctis’s.

“Stay back!” Noctis shouts, and there’s a fair bit of glowing magic as he warps over to the daemon’s location, daggers flashing as he attacks. Ardyn watches, then sends his awareness out to summon a few more. He’s curious. He wants to see Noctis fight. After all, if he can’t handle a few dozen flans, he’s going to be dreadfully outmatched by the Accursed.

Flans are such bizarre creatures, Ardyn thinks, watching as the trembling mass of daemonic goo tries to waddle its way closer. He could, he supposes, string up an arrow or two with the crossbow for show if nothing else – but he doesn’t think Noctis is paying him any attention, maybe just enough to ascertain that he isn’t being attacked or in danger.

He can feel it when the flan dies. The Scourge shifts inside, burning, pressing at the backs of his eyes and snarling, demanding vengeance for its fallen brethren. While Noctis sheathes his daggers and moves ever forward, Ardyn waits until he’s exited the area before turning around, opening his mouth, and taking in what is left of the daemon before it vanishes.

It isn’t much. But it’s something. And he hates these creatures far less than he does the ones above the temple, or the ones above that -- the Astrals who inspire humans to build them cities and wonders alike, then turn disinterested to sleep while those marvels crumble into ruin.

**v. third floor….and third floor, and third floor, again.**

“There’s usually a lot more daemons in these places,” Noctis says, clearly on edge and waiting for another ambush. They’re walking around the third floor, again, heading for the same set of stairs they’ve been up and down before. More than once. To no avail.

Ardyn is not looking forward to crossing that narrow ledge again. He’s immortal, not immune to gravity.

“Perhaps they are as tired of watching us take this same path as I am of traversing it,” Ardyn offers. Honestly, this is taking much longer than it should but he’s loathe to be _too_ helpful. In some ways this is an indulgence and he knows it; it is the last time he shall be in Noctis’s presence when Noctis finds him a mostly-harmless eccentric with an unknown agenda and vague penchant toward helpfulness.

Altissia will bring sorrow and loss and the death of his beloved, as well as the end of all Noctis’s illusions that Ardyn isn’t a threat. And on his part, Ardyn knows that whatever freedom he thinks he’s been given to design this plan and how it will end is all illusory; he has no more agency in this than does Noctis, not really.

Long ago Ardyn considered another path: gaining Noctis’s aid in fighting the Astrals, breaking the eternal chains that bind them as nothing more than opposing kings on a cosmic chessboard.

But that path is lost, now; blocked by the ruins of Insomnia and drenched in the blood of Noctis’s royal father. And it is just as well, for that way lay uncertainty, the possibility of failure and the spectre of Noctis’s death, which would have taken Ardyn’s only chance for redemption and revenge with him to the grave. Ardyn is not willing to barter with the only end that is certain.

But this – ah, this momentary curiosity, to be alone with Noctis before the stakes are made clear, before the bloody line is drawn in the sand. This is Ardyn’s own choice, and while it serves no real purpose he finds himself moving ever closer to the dark flame of his own destruction, fighting a strong desire to touch Noctis, to run his hands through Noctis’s dark hair and ask him a thousand questions to which he knows Noctis cannot answer.

_How did it feel, to know the Crystal chose you? Did they ever tell you what it meant, that you were naught but a sacrifice raised to the slaughter? Like the story of the daughter of a warlord long forgotten, sacrificed to the gods for favorable winds to carry his army’s ships to war? All I ever wanted to be was a Healer. Were you ever allowed to want anything, or did they think it too dangerous to allow you the comfort of knowing your own mind before it was made for you?_

Instead, Ardyn watches Noctis, appreciating the sheer physicality of his fighting technique and the elegant way he uses his elemancy. There’s one particular mixture which must include holy, as it makes the darkness in Ardyn’s own veins recoil in sympathetic horror, but it is effective at clearing the way when necessary.

As adept with magic as he is, and as skilled in the art of fighting...Noctis could use a few lessons on how to mark a trail. Or perhaps a compass.

“Son of a _bitch_ ,” Noctis shouts, from where he is standing halfway across a bridge. “There’s something --”

Before he finishes, the rocks crumble and Noctis’s lithe form tumbles to the floor below. Ardyn startles, and he no longer has a heart but if he did he thinks it might have jumped out of his chest at the sight of Noctis _falling_ like that.

 _If he dies in here from something as mundane as a broken bone, I shall find every last one of you and burn your corpses into ash,_ Ardyn thinks at the Astrals, surprised by the strength of his reaction to Noctis taking a bit of a tumble. But he can’t quite help it.

“And how like the lot of you would it be,” Ardyn grumbles, as he goes to inspect the damage, “to break your chosen sword before it was blooded? And for me to pay the price of your failure?”

 

**vi. fourth floor**

There’s an iron giant blocking their path. Ardyn shoots an arrow or two at it and then watches Noctis dispatch it with a dizzying array of weaponry. Noctis warps around like a cyclone, finishing the beast off with a particularly brutal thrust of his greatsword in its throat.

Ardyn moves back as the daemon’s essence disintegrates. He flicks his wrists and sends a host of mindflayers toward Noctis, wondering what he will do with his magic all but exhausted and his lean form trembling from exertion. This is all for Noctis’s future benefit, really. He should be thanking Ardyn for the preparation.

It’s rather _exciting_ , watching this. A trial for a future king, like the days of old when the title was gifted by might instead birthright.

 _The good old days,_ Ardyn thinks, and aims an arrow when a mindflayer gets a bit too close to Ardyn’s instrument of doom. _No, no. You may bedevil him, but do keep those tentacles where I can see them._

“Can you, like, _do_ something?” Noctis snarls at him, drawing forth what appears to be a large axe -- and oh, no, that’s the worst possible thing he could use in this situation but Ardyn doesn’t say a word to change his mind. If he wants to swing an axe like some madman, by all means.

“Oh, of course. I’m simply not used to being _besieged_ in this fashion,” Ardyn says smoothly, readying his crossbow. He’s a decent marksman; even a healer had to know how to defend what was his.

It’s amusing, fighting daemons alongside Noctis. Ardyn bears no ill will toward the mindless creatures that infest dark places, bereft of their once-human minds and rendered down into pure instinct and hunger. But Noctis is worth all of them, and it’s somewhat surprising, this possessiveness he’s feeling, but maybe it shouldn’t be.

After all, Noctis has been brought forth for _him_ , to deliver both his death and his revenge. No daemon shall take him away from Ardyn, who does not think his sanity will last however long it will take Bahamut and his brethren to fashion another line of kings that might produce one who shall be able to slay him.  

When the mindflayers are no more, Ardyn sends out his awareness to keep the creatures at bay for a bit as they continue to search. He wants Noctis to be ready when the time comes, but they _do_ need to make it out of this bloody temple.

And that’s becoming a bit more of a challenge than anticipated, because they are still lost.

Noctis is running up and down passageways they’ve already searched, across bridges that miraculously reform after crashing into rubble. He mutters to himself, hurls a flask of lightning magic at a door that won’t open in a fit of temper, uses a rock to scratch markings on a wall though Ardyn isn’t precisely sure why. He also uses it to write _fuck this temple,_ which is amusing if utterly useless.

“It is likely for the best you were never destined to be a cartographer,” Ardyn tells him. _Or immortal, since you clearly do not have the patience for it._

Noctis’s expression goes sour. He rakes a hand through his hair, and Ardyn takes a moment to appreciate the fine bone structure of his face revealed as the messy black strands are pushed back. “There has to be some passage we’re missing. A door. _Something._ ”

There is, and they’ve walked by it at least three times. Ardyn doesn’t mention it, just summons a few flans and some imps and smiles as Noctis groans aloud and gears up to fight. Ardyn thinks it might help Noctis deal with his frustration.

“I believe there is a passageway, back there,” Ardyn says once the daemons are no more, as if he just now thought of it. “Perhaps it bears a second glance.”

“Pretty sure that was covered in rocks,” Noctis says, all stubborn pride, hands on his hips. He has dirt on his face and his cheeks are flushed with exertion. Ardyn lets his eyes linger, can tell that Noctis is aware of his slow scrutiny.  “But sure. Why not look _again_ , if you say so. You’re probably the reason I’m fucking lost in the first place,” he mutters, and bumps against Ardyn, hard, as he stomps past him.

It’s the first time Noctis has touched him, and everything inside Ardyn lights up and _screams_ at the contact, as brief though it is -- he feels like the daemons he’s watched disintegrate, feels like he’s drowning in the water above the temple, like he’s crushed under the rocks manipulated by long-forgotten magic in this ancient temple of death. His breath catches and his eyes go wide, and if Noctis turned around now he would see the truth of what Ardyn is staring him right in the face -- ink-black veins against paper-pale skin, eyes drowned in dark, mouth stained and gaping.

But Noctis doesn’t look back, and Ardyn gathers himself together enough that when he joins Noctis in the corridor he looks like he always does; just a man garbed in mismatched clothes, all sly smiles and dubious intent.

Touching Noctis is _exhilarating._ Ardyn wants to do it again. It reminds him of when he was young and mortal, of summer visits to Tenebrae when he would go cliff diving with his cousins. That moment of fear standing at the edge, and the sheer delight of falling free and unencumbered, the water rushing closer, closer, the cold shock of it on sun-warmed skin.

Noctis is staring in befuddled annoyance at the staircase they haven’t seen before. “This was totally not here a minute ago.” He glances at Ardyn like he’s daring Ardyn to disagree. His eyes are dark blue and endless, like the water in that long-ago quarry.

“Hmm,” Ardyn says, fingers flexing, fighting the urge to touch, to _jump_. He adjusts his hat, feels bits of himself fighting to realign like a puzzle knocked apart so the pieces don’t quite fit. “We must have overlooked it.”

Noctis gives him a suspicious look. Before he can ask anything, Ardyn sends a few flans and a necromancer to entertain him, while he finishes putting the facade of himself back together again.

When he feels a bit more settled, he sights an arrow at the necromancer, lets go, and watches it fade into nothing.

**vii. fifth floor**

The thing they must fight in the heart of the dungeon is a big, marvelous flying creature that is no daemon, is older than the Scourge, and provides a challenging encounter that Ardyn finds he quite enjoys.

Noctis is a fighter in a way Ardyn is not. Ardyn used his bow when he was mortal to defend himself, but he was never as fond of sacks and sieges -- offensive tactics --  as his brother. Even now, Ardyn keeps to the perimeter -- the thing cannot kill him and that is the danger of it, for Noctis cannot know yet that Ardyn is immortal. Nor can he know the secret of Ardyn’s lineage, which means Ardyn is limited in his range and cannot himself warp to gain an advantage over the beast.

“Noctis,” he calls, watching Noctis throw _yet another_ fire spell at the shrieking creature that fails to do anything save annoy it. Pleasant challenge or no, it’s beginning to bore him -- and Noctis almost set him on fire, _again_. “This is a creature of air and flight, yes?”

“Then why the fuck is it living underground in a cave?” Noctis calls back, disgruntled. He’s hanging somewhere off the ceiling to Ardyn’s right. And that is, Ardyn supposes, a fair point.

“What magic does one use when confronting beasts of the sky?” Ardyn asks, patiently, in the voice he used during his tenure as an instructor of mages, way back in the fifth century before most of them became -- necromancers, actually. Perhaps his arrow felled a former student. What an odd thing, immortality.  

“Yeah, I’m on it, just keep shooting your arrows and stay out of my way,” Noctis orders, bossily, and Ardyn almost laughs as he readies another arrow and sends it toward the monster.

The lightning flash comes soon after, followed by another, and then another. There’s something in Noctis’s magic that makes Ardyn want to slink off into a dark corner and hiss, but he fights the urge and stays where he is, finishing up with the last of his arrows -- subtly imbued with a lightning spell of his own, because _honestly_ , this is already taken twice as long as it should have.

Noctis leaps upon the creature and finishes it with a slice across the thing’s throat, dual daggers flashing as the monster falls.

There is a glimmer behind the fallen foe, and Noctis catches sight of it as he hops off the creature’s back. “I think that must be the mythril.” Noctis walks over and grabs it, tossing it in the air and shooting Ardyn a grin full of amused satisfaction as he catches it. “I wonder if that bird thought this was like, an egg or something?”

“Birds are ever fond of shiny things,” Ardyn says, walking closer. Noctis holds up the mythril for a moment, then shrugs and tosses it into the air once more. This time, instead of catching it, it vanishes with a blue glimmer into his Armiger.

“Okay,” he says, arms crossed. “Only thing left to do is leave. But before we do that...you gonna get on with it?”

Ardyn, unsure what he means, blinks. “With what? You have found the prize you sought. I hate to disappoint, but if you are in need of some other magic metal, you shan’t find it here.”

“Not what I’m talking about.” Noctis’s eyes narrow. “Cut the bullshit, Chancellor. There’s a reason you wanted to come with me, and we both know what it is.”

“For you to find the mythril,” Ardyn says, slowly, as if he’s missed a page or two of a play in which he was an unwilling performer. “Did I not make that sufficiently clear?”

“Uh-huh.” Noctis crosses his arms over his chest. “Didn’t really need your help, though. Probably would have done it quicker without you.”

Ardyn’s eyes narrow. “Dear boy. Without me, you would still be searching for the staircase to this floor. If you don’t believe me, go back and see how many marks you made before I suggested we look elsewhere. And the profanity you left on the wall. In a _temple_.”

Noctis doesn’t appear convinced -- or bothered by his blasphemous graffiti. “Why don’t we talk about what you’re really after?”

Ardyn stares at him. He doesn’t have a single clue what that means. “All right. Why don’t you tell me what you think that is?” _I guarantee you won’t get it right._ This reminds him, again, of jumping into the quarry -- only without knowing what waits at the bottom, water or dry bed full of jagged, pointed rocks.

“It’s pretty obvious,” Noctis huffs, giving Ardyn this _look_. “All that nonsense in Lestallum?”

Ardyn has lived a long time. He is not an easy man to surprise, or throw off-kilter. And yet Noctis is managing to do so with surprising ease, which is both strangely satisfying and oddly worrying. His voice is entirely devoid of its usual false cheer when he says, “What nonsense would that be, Your Highness?”

Noctis rolls his eyes, looking so out of sorts that it would be satisfying if Ardyn were doing it on purpose, which he’s not. “ _You might find the cab fare to be more than you bargained for?”_

It takes Ardyn a moment to realize what Noctis is referring to -- that flippant remark Ardyn made at the car park, when Noctis mentioned riding with him to the Disc of Cauthess.

Surely he doesn’t think --

“ _Dear_ boy,” Ardyn says, finally aware of what Noctis is hinting at. “Did you think I followed you down here to _seduce_ you?” In a cave? When he could have done so near a comfortable bed?

“Yeah?” Noctis says, blinking wide blue eyes at him. “I mean. You’re kind of intense about me. I figured you were gonna try and impress me and then make a move. Guess I was wrong.”

“And does that disappoint you?” Ardyn asks, because he never would have thought Noctis perceived his attentions as sexual in the slightest. _Ardyn_ hadn’t realized they were, not until this little jaunt down into the dark.

“That I’m wrong?” Noctis just shrugs. “I mean. I don’t trust you, and I’m pretty sure you know that and don’t care. And as much as you keep _helping_ me, I can tell you don’t actually like me.”

That’s an astute observation, but what Ardyn feels for Noctis is so much more complicated than simple dislike. Ardyn gives him a careless smile. “Why, Noctis. Whyever would I dislike you?”

“Dunno. But you do. Am I wrong?”

Ardyn’s smile fades, and he lets the glamor of disinterest and vague amusement drop entirely. “You’re not wrong, but that doesn’t mean you’re right.”

Noctis just makes a face at him and rolls his eyes. “Whatever. I don’t like you, either. I mean. I don’t know you, and your help always ends up with me fighting monsters or pissed-off gods, so. Not real sure you’re all that _helpful_ , actually.”

“And yet, if I attempted to seduce you, you would allow it?”

“Depends, I guess.” Noctis moves closer, unafraid and uncowed, because he might not like Ardyn or trust him, but he doesn’t yet hate him.

_Soon, my young prince. Soon you will kneel and take the crown of rage I will bestow upon you, and then you shall truly be the King of Kings._

“On what?” Ardyn asks, tilting his head.

“If you were any good at it,” Noctis answers. “So far, you’re not. Looks like there’s nothing else to do but leave.”

The smart thing to do here, of course, would be to simply agree - or even act offended, perhaps, just to see what might happen -- and leave. But Ardyn did not expect to be offered this opportunity, and he wonders if perhaps he would be foolish to pass it up.

Noctis is a king without a kingdom but he believes himself in service to a higher calling -- marry his beloved and take back what was stolen, and to that end he is scouring Eos for old tombs, drawing the aspects of his ancestors into an arsenal he believes will help him achieve his goals.

_You think being the Chosen King means you are chosen to restore Lucis and your Crystal. You think you have nothing left to lose, because Niflheim and its army took everything from you that truly matters. But I will take so much more, Noctis. Beloved bride and cherished companions, the very light of the sun itself -- I will flay you alive, strip you down into nothing but bleached bone, so the gods can sharpen you into the weapon you were always meant to be._

“Perhaps,” Ardyn says, one hand going up to trap Noctis against the wall behind him. “Perhaps not. I was not aware you would be receptive to such an overture, though I assure you, my preferred method of seduction very rarely includes so many stairs, falling rocks, or giant monsters.”

“Again,” Noctis says, sounding bored. “Not saying I’m receptive, not saying I’m not. But I’m ready to get out of here, so if you’re planning on trying something you better do it now. You’re not going to get the chance again.”

That is a truth Ardyn knows, even better than Noctis.

He leans down, slowly, and presses his mouth to Noctis’s. It’s warm against his own, and his entire being shudders and shakes like he’s been struck by the lightning Noctis hurled at the monster they fought. “Then I suppose I had best take it, hmm?”

Ardyn kisses him, and it does feel like falling. But he’s still not sure what awaits him at the bottom -- the water, or the rocks.

“You can try,” Noctis says, against his mouth. “But I just fought a monster, so you better make it interesting if you want to keep my attention.”

_Make it interesting, says the Chosen King to the Immortal Accursed. Oh, Noctis. I shall endeavor to do everything in my unholy power to do just that, I promise._

“As your highness commands,” Ardyn says, and reaches down, grabbing Noctis beneath his thighs and hauling him up so can slam Noctis back against the wall. He kisses him with fervor, as if he’s trying to devour him, to suck his soul out and swallow it down, drown Noctis’s light with the power of his own darkness.

Noctis kisses him back like he wants Ardyn to do it, like he’s _taunting_ him. He wraps his legs around Ardyn’s waist and grinds against him, and Ardyn is surprised to feel the hardness there, between Noctis’s legs.

It must show somehow on his face because Noctis laughs, the sound just a little too mocking to be kind, and wraps his fingers in Ardyn’s hair. “What? Danger kinda gets me going. That a problem?”

“And here I thought it was me,” Ardyn says, drolly, and pushes lazily back, his own arousal growing simply from the idea of how much Noctis will later loathe what he’s so obviously asking Ardyn for.

 _I could kill you so easily,_ Ardyn thinks, feeling Noctis toss his hat off his head and onto the ground, so he can more fully grab and pull Ardyn’s hair. _And you think me an eccentric who wanted to be alone with you simply to seduce you._

If it weren’t the thing that would damn Ardyn for all eternity, he might kill Noctis just because he could.

There’s a sharp sting on his face, sudden and surprising -- Noctis has just slapped him.

“Hey,” Noctis says, glaring, his face flushed, dark blue eyes glittering bright like his magic. “Not here for you to space out.”

The slap doesn’t hurt, not really -- but it the sheer audacity that Noctis just _smacked him in the face_ does something to him, pulls a growl that is dangerously close to inhuman to the surface as Ardyn bites the smooth skin of Noctis’s throat, wanting to leave a mark. _Let them all see. Let them all know you let me put my hands on you, my mouth. The gods, your companions, all of them._

Noctis is _his_. Others claim his friendship, his affection, even his love -- but Noctis belongs to Ardyn in a way he does no one else, not friend or lover or father or bride. He is Ardyn’s destiny and his doom, his revenge and his redemption, the wielder and the blade of the sword that will deliver him at last.

 _Mine,_ Ardyn thinks, shoving Noctis hard against the wall and kissing him like he really _is_ trying to devour him. _Mine and no one else’s, you were born for me, you were made by the gods for me. Lover, killer, king, you are mine and mine alone and I will have you._

Noctis makes a strangled sound and kisses back just as hungrily, and maybe he feels this, the connection between them -- maybe he thinks it is just mindless lust, devoid of any other thought or meaning, and Ardyn finds he doesn’t much care if that’s true or not.

In the end, this is Noctis’s idea. He’ll remember that, when they face each other as the rivals they are meant to be. As equals. With blood that matters spilled between them, wounds not easily healed with a potion and a good night’s rest.

For now….there is no reason not to enjoy this for what it is, heated mouths and eager hands, clothes pulled aside and soft groans breaking the endless _drip-drop, drip-drop_ of water sliding down stone.

Ardyn’s hands shove under Noctis’s shirt, seeking skin. Noctis is shorter than Ardyn by at least five inches, his stature slender where Ardyn’s is wide-shouldered and broad, but the body beneath his hands is toned and well-muscled regardless. Noctis’s thighs are gripped strong around Ardyn’s hips, he’s grinding against Ardyn’s cock with obvious eagerness and the tongue in Ardyn’s mouth is bold and demanding.

He’s trying to take what he wants, despite Ardyn’s greater size and strength, and it is so attractive, so emblematic of the king Ardyn needs Noctis to be that Ardyn groans, loudly, and his own arousal is suddenly far more pressing in its urgency.

“You are quite something,” Ardyn says, voice caught halfway between desire and rage, and that is more emotion than he’s felt around anyone in longer than he can remember. Noctis helps him take off his shirt, and his skin is moon-pale in the dim light, smooth and just asking for Ardyn to mar it with fingers and teeth.

“You’re wearing way too much clothing,” Noctis says, in response, pulling at the scarf and hooded cloak of his outwear. “And it’s all weird.”

Ardyn’s response is to bite Noctis, hard, just below the jut of his collarbone. He examines the mark left there with satisfaction, licking it not to soothe but to savor. “I suspect that is a problem easily remedied, should you wish me to wear less clothing.”

“Ugh. How about how much you talk? Can I shove something in your mouth and shut you up?” Noctis drags Ardyn’s head back with a hand in his hair. “Seriously, I’m asking for a reason.”

Ardyn smiles lazily, grinding his hips hard against Noctis’s own. “No need to ask, Noctis. If you want something, do try and take it. We shall see if you get it.”

Noctis shoves at his shoulders with both hands. It accomplishes nothing, because Ardyn intends to make him work for it. Noctis just keeps pushing down, as if repetition will make Ardyn get on his knees like Noctis so clearly wants. “All the weapons at your disposal, do you not think perhaps to use one?”

Noctis stills at that. He pulls on Ardyn’s hair, not too hard, but enough to bring their gazes together. Noctis’s face is flushed, his mouth bitten red from Ardyn’s bruising kisses, marks from Ardyn’s bites on his neck and chest. “Hey. No. I’m not -- that’s not my style. You don’t want it, then fine. But I’m not putting a dagger to your throat and making you get on your knees, no way.”

Ardyn grabs Noctis’s wrists, pinning them above his head against the damp stone. “Oh, but you don’t understand, Noctis. Your blade at my throat is all I’ve ever wanted.”

Noctis blinks at him. “You might be too weird for me,” he says, so earnestly that Ardyn nearly laughs. “Seriously. I like it a little rough but, uh. Daggers? Hard limit.”

“Oh, live a little,” Ardyn murmurs, kissing him, though he’s not terribly surprised at Noctis’s reluctance. “If you can’t force me, then try something else. Some other talent at your disposal.”

Noctis is still for so long that Ardyn almost hits his own head against the rocks in frustration. “Try using your royal skill at diplomacy, perhaps, if you have no wish to use your weaponry?” Ardyn kisses down his chest, bites at a nipple, enjoys the way Noctis writhes and how, when he brings his hands to cradle Noctis’s slim hips, Noctis drops his arms and goes back to pulling on Ardyn’s hair again.

“Suck me off, play with my ass and then you can fuck me,” Noctis says, voice husky with arousal. “That diplomatic enough for you?”

“I suppose it will have to do,” sighs Ardyn, and sinks gracefully to his knees. He pulls Noctis’s pants and underwear down, which takes some maneuvering to get them over his boots, and grabs Noctis around the hips and lifts him up. “Put your legs over my shoulders.”

Noctis does so, and oh, but he looks good like this, naked save for his boots and his cock hard and flushed, pressed against a wall with his legs hooked over Ardyn’s shoulders. He doesn’t seem to know what to do with his hands, though, and Ardyn turns his head to bite at Noctis’s thigh, hard enough to feel that slim body writhe against him before he looks up and says, “Grab my hair if you like. I assure you, I can hold you.”

“I -- you’re stronger than you look,” Noctis says, voice breathless, and he sounds good like that, Ardyn thinks, and makes a pleased sound when Noctis does as instructed and fists his hair again.

“Yes. And don’t worry about hurting me. I assure you, if I don’t enjoy it, you’ll know.”

“Okay,” says Noctis, a little wildly, hips thrusting forward. “Sure.”

Ardyn takes him in his mouth and he sets a fast, harsh rhythm, tongue slicking over the damp head of Noctis’s cock, easily keeping his weight braced against the wall as he licks and sucks. Ardyn keeps one hand on Noctis’s hip, the other he reaches up and presses against Noctis’s mouth. “Be so good as to get these wet for me, would you?”

Noctis makes an accommodating sort of noise, leaning down and twisting so he can suck on Ardyn’s fingers while Ardyn returns his efforts to Noctis’s cock, to making him writhe, to feeling those thighs shake and tremble from pleasure. He can tell Noctis is close, and Ardyn pulls his hand away, fingers nice and wet, and teases gently at Noctis’s hole. Noctis doesn’t fight him – _of course he doesn’t, why would he? Noctis belongs to him, he is Ardyn’s, isn’t he, Ardyn’s lover and murderer and victim and king_ – and Noctis is moaning, loudly, enough to echo through the stone chamber as Ardyn fucks him open with his fingers.  

“I’m close,” Noctis warns, violet strands of hair pulled taut over slim fingers. “You want me to come in your mouth, or when you’re fucking me?”

Ardyn pulls off enough to smirk up at him, pleased at how disheveled Noctis looks, pinned like a butterfly by nothing but the pleasure Ardyn is giving him. “Perhaps I want you to chose, and to hear you ask me to give it to you.”

“Fuck me, then,” Noctis says without hesitation. He kicks at Ardyn’s back, and the heel of one of those thick-soled boots knocks unpleasantly against Ardyn’s shoulder.  “And make it fucking worth it.”

Ardyn rises to his feet, kissing Noctis hotly as he positions him against the wall again, drags Noctis’s legs into position so they’re wrapped snugly around his hips. They kiss with growing intensity as Noctis reaches down, hand battling with Ardyn’s to get his pants undone. Noctis is naked save his black boots, Ardyn is divested only of his hat and his coat and accoutrements, fully dressed enough that Noctis mutters _too many accessories, for fuck’s sake_ , into his mouth while he struggles to get at Ardyn’s cock.

When Ardyn’s cock is free, Noctis pulls his hand away and makes a show of licking it, spitting on it in a way that is filthy and utterly arousing. He drops it between them again to slick up Ardyn’s cock, which is already wet from precome, and then Ardyn fits himself between Noctis’s legs and presses in, slowly, wanting this to last, this moment when Ardyn breaches him and takes what he was never meant to have.

Noctis’s body is tight and hot, and he’s biting at Ardyn’s shoulder through his shirt because it has to hurt. But Noctis is also pulling at him with eager hands, heels pressing against Ardyn’s lower back and urging him to keep going. When he’s fully seated, Noctis pulls his face away from Ardyn’s shoulder and gasps for breath, shuddering, his eyes glazed with lust.

“C’mon, fuck me,” he pants, settling his hands on Ardyn’s shoulders. He smiles, then -- intimate and a little like they’re sharing a joke, he and Ardyn, and maybe they are. Ardyn closes his eyes and gives in to the demands of his body, hips grinding in a slow circle before he starts fucking Noctis with hard, sharp thrusts.

“Yeah,” Noctis moans, fingers digging in tight to the muscles of Ardyn’s shoulders. He’s writhing against him, too, and Ardyn is sure Noctis’s back will be a mess of scratches by the time they’re done.

Ardyn keeps Noctis pressed against the wall with his weight and one hand, the other going down to stroke Noctis’s cock. “My, Your Highness,” Ardyn murmurs, enjoying the way Noctis writhes and bucks in his arms. “One would think you wouldn’t have to rely on an Imperial Chancellor and a dungeon to get the hard ride you so desperately needed.”

“Like -- you’re not -- fucking loving it,” Noctis bites out, one hand still caught in Ardyn’s hair and the other going to down to join Ardyn’s on his cock, forcing Ardyn to stroke him like he so obviously wants. “This is the -- most useful -- you’ve been since I met you.”

Ardyn laughs, the sound dragged out of him almost unwilling because of how genuine it is. For a moment he thinks again of his plan to enlist Noctis’s aid in overthrowing the gods, and how it might have gone with the two of them, allies against the Astrals instead of adversaries by their design.

“Then I am glad to finally be of service,” Ardyn says, biting gently at Noctis’s ear. “Now be a good boy and come on my cock for me. Show me how much of a whore the King of Lucis is, so eager for a hard fuck he’ll take it from an enemy while his friends battle daemons in his absence.”

That, of course, does the trick -- Noctis growls and calls him a name, unknowingly insulting his own ancestry in the process, yanking Ardyn’s hair and smacking him across the face, again, and then again, his mouth, telling Ardyn _to shut your fucking mouth and get me off_ and for some reason, perhaps because he knows this moment is destined to end and never be repeated, Ardyn does both.

He fucks Noctis relentlessly, hand keeping time on Noctis’s cock, wet now from the copious amounts of precome. Noctis comes with a shout and a bite of his own, teeth sinking into Ardyn’s neck. Ardyn thinks about what would happen if Noctis got a mouthful of the Scourge and the thought makes him moan, louder than he means to, and he buries his face against Noctis’s neck as he shudders and comes hard.

It’s been a long time since he’s indulged in this sort of thing and the world wavers a bit, he feels their magic -- contradictory in an oddly complimentary way -- crash together, a scent like sweet rot and petrichor filling the chamber around them, the pleasure mind-numbing and terrifying in that it reminds Ardyn for one hateful moment of what it felt like to be alive and _human_ and it won’t just be Noctis that thinks back and hates this moment of shared pleasure, not at all.

_Jumping and falling and this time there was water at the end of it, but next time, all that waits for us both is the rocks._

They are silent when it’s over. Noctis dresses and Ardyn reassembles his various pieces of clothing, cheerful mismatched armor worn to hide the monster within.

 _Not for much longer,_  he thinks, somewhat in relief. It has been a long time. As he stands there, watching Noctis stretch and roll his neck, he thinks of how very, very long he’s been waiting to die.

“Let’s get out of here,” Noctis says, and turns to go.

Ardyn spares a glance for the creature that still lies dead in the center of the chamber. He thinks about what it will be like, their eventual battle, when he is the monster at the heart of the dungeon, the thing to be slain. There will be a different kind of pleasure to be had, then.  And neither of the will emerge unscathed.

“As you wish,” Ardyn says, scooping up his hat and settling it once more atop his head, “Your Majesty.”

If Noctis notices the use of his proper title, he doesn’t mention it. It’s all right. What’s important isn’t that Noctis hears it said, but that Ardyn says it -- and believes it.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I made up that last part of the "fortune favors the bold, but patience crowns the victor" proverb, but whatever, I have to do _something_ with that classics degree :| 
> 
> Full disclosure I got lost for like a real-time hour in this stupid dungeon.


End file.
